Flathead cherry crop stunted by winter freeze

Northwest Montana’s January freeze is having lasting effects on the area, notably in Flathead Lake’s cherry orchards. 

At Sunset Bay, temperatures bottomed out at negative 14 between Jan. 10-13. Finley Point saw temperatures in the negative 20s. North toward Bigfork, temperatures were similar if not colder. 

“I hate to say the good news is my trees are alive,” Sunset Bay grower and Flathead Cherry Growers Cooperative board member Bruce Johnson said. “And they’re doing well, but maybe that is the good news right now is that we don’t have a very big cherry crop but the trees are doing just fine here. But I think there are some spots along the Flathead that were colder and are probably not as fortunate as I am.”

Monson Fruit Company field representative Brian Campbell, who owns an orchard on Finley Point and is a consultant for growers around the lake, noted that there has been heavier damage at Finley Point, where some of the older Lambert trees aren’t expected to survive. In Bigfork, some younger orchards are having a slow start leafing out and may not make it as well. One grower was estimated to have lost between 200-300 new fruit trees they planted recently.

“I think in general you can say the only bright note really is this Blue Bay area. Honestly, all of Yellow Bay and beyond; Woods Bay, Bigfork area up there, there’s next to nothing, and south of here too, Finley Point, there’s zip when it comes to sweet cherries,” Campbell said. 

It has been 33 years since the last big freeze in 1991 that affected orchards around Flathead Lake. Before that, in 1989, Campbell remembered a freeze that made this year’s “seem like child’s play.” As older variety Lambert trees, which the Flathead is famous for, have died out over the years, many growers have replaced them with varieties bred in Canada that fruit later in the season to compete with the earlier Washington cherry market. Many also self-pollinate, unlike Lamberts, and are more firm for shipping purposes. Johnson grows Lapins, Skeenas and Sweethearts. 

“The Canadian varieties, we think, are better suited to northwest Montana than a variety that was maybe born in Walla Walla or someplace hot,” Johnson said. However, he noted that even the trees bred in Canada had a hard time this winter. While some trees will be ready to restart full production again next year, some lost their fruit buds and spurs, which will always be dead and affect the trees production for years until the wood is renewed.  Older trees, like some of the Lamberts at Finley Point, had their trunks split. When dead trees are replaced by young trees, it can be a few years before they produce at a quantity that offsets the cost of replanting. 

“People will nurse along what they can,” Campbell said. 

“There’s some discouraged growers that have had a few bad years in a row, it’s possible we some orchards going out, I’ve heard of a couple rumors of that.”

In a good year, the Flathead Cherry Grower Co-op’s 80 members can produce three million pounds of cherries.  A good tree can produce 60 pounds by itself. Campbell used Johnson’s harvest, which is expected to be favorable compared to some others this year, as an example, and suggested it could be as low as three pounds per tree in a worst-case scenario. If production is too low, it becomes infeasible to hire pickers, who are paid by the pound. 

“In a good year we would probably bring in two to three hundred migrant cherry pickers that come into the area and buy food and gas and things here and employ other local people that help with the harvest. Farming in general, farmers are buying local tools, equipment, fertilizers., sprays and material chemicals. So it contributes to the economy in that way, it’s hard to put a number on it,” Campbell said. 

Flathead cherries make up less than 1% of the Northwest United States’ cherry production. They are also low on the totem pole for the state of Montana’s crops, as there is limited area they can grow along the lake. Most growers have cherry orchards as a secondary income source, as crops are never a sure thing. 

Monson Fruit Company collects 80% of Flathead Cherry Growers Co-op harvests, which are then marketed and distributed worldwide at a price largely determined by surrounding cherry crops, namely in Washington. The remaining 20% is the growers’ to do as they please with, and is what fuels a lot of the roadside cherry stands tourists and locals frequent in the late summer. The price per pound at those locations is expected to increase. 

“It’s kind of like gas stations,” Campbell said. 

“They’ll look up and down and see what the neighbors are doing,” Johnson added. 

The somewhat good news about there being less cherries is that each tree can allocate more resources to less fruit, resulting in larger cherries. This can increase poundage and is generally good for pickers and growers. But the trees still have to make it through June drop, where 10-60% of their flowers may fall due to lack of pollination. 

“At this time of the year when people ask me, I usually tell them, ‘We’ve got a lot of cherries on the tree, but before we put them in the box and sell them, we’ve got to go through several different weather situations, we’ve got to make sure the bugs don’t get them, and we’ve got to make sure the price is right.’ There’s just a lot of hoops to jump through before we get to the harvest time with a good crop. And now we’re telling you, ‘We’re starting with a bad crop.’ And we’ve still got to jump through all those damn hoops,” Johnson said. 

To those thinking, “You mean there won’t be any cherries?” Johnson says, 

“No, that’s not what we’re saying. There’s going to be some, and I think that there will be cherry stands along the roads selling cherries, but there won’t be as many.”